With their EP Lungs, released in May, Ruti has proven themselves as one of those rare lyricists who can sing about heartbreak without resorting to clichés. The production is highly creative, drawing from a variety of genres including R’n’B and Jazz. From acoustic to electronic sounds, a whole palette of colours embraces Ruti’s stunning vocals.
Following up the EP, Ruti released their newest single “Break My Own Heart” end of August, diving deeper into a dark, glittery electronic sound. Looking ahead to a new year and new releases, it’s high time we got to know this exciting emerging artist a little better.
Musical Memories
Lilly Timme: Ruti, with a voice like yours I’m finding it hard to imagine that there was a time you didn’t aim to be a singer, yet I’ve heard that your first love was dance.
Ruti: Oh yeah, when I was really young, I used to do dance lessons. I feel like my mom could see that I had a lot of energy to burn. So, I started ballet and tap modern when I was about three years old. I used to dance at church or home, listening to the music channel with my dad. Through dance, I got into musicals and performing in general. But I’d say music started to become more important to me when I was eleven. I bought an iPod Touch with some money I’d saved and I got 21 by Adele and Pink Friday by Nicki Minaj – those were the first two albums I ever bought. Especially Adele and the way that she sang inspired me.
That same year in summer, I won a talent show and it made me realise that I love singing, the way that it feels in my body and I’m actually good at it! I find it is a good stim, like a word or a movement that is self-soothing. But it’s not just about making me feel good. I like to explore what my voice can do and make up melodies. I actually have a list of my favorite melodies ever. You know how you hear something and get an immediate visceral reaction to certain notes in a row?
What’s on the list? I’m curious now.
My favorite guy at the moment is Labi Siffre. His song “My Song” is definitely on the list. It goes:
“And I wonder
if you know what it means
to find your dreams come true.”
It‘s so pure and wholesome. Labi Siffre has been sampled by Eminem and Kanye West. He’s got really famous songs as well but no one really knows him by name. He’s a British artist from the late sixties, early seventies, and through the eighties and nineties. When I heard that song for the first time, my mind was so blown I just did not know what to do. But yeah, I’m gonna cut that off. So you can ask me another question.
I enjoyed listening to you, though. I can sense that you feel very strongly about him.
Yeah, he’s the only person that if I met I would immediately break down into tears. His voice is amazing. It’s not like an Aretha Franklin or Whitney Houston voice, it’s more like a Simon and Garfunkel voice, very pure. And he was an openly Black, gay man in the UK during the late sixties, early seventies, and eighties… I love him so much, and I hope one day I’ll get to meet him and just say that. I don’t really need to ask him any questions, I just wanna say “You’re great, I love you“ and then I’ll cry, and he’ll back away slowly. He would be like „Okaaaayyy, cool.”
Beyond the Surface
So talking about your own songs: Besides listening to other artists, how does inspiration work for you?
Specific moments, sounds, or feelings inspire me. It can be simple things like feeling the sun on my skin on a warm day. I’ve barely touched the surface of what I want to say. I feel very deeply sometimes and have to take a moment before writing because often I don’t even know what to say. The emotion is in my stomach, or my chest, like visceral physical pain, nervousness, or excitement. I can’t write about it until I calm down a little bit. Not because the song will be too vulnerable, but because I literally can’t process it in real-time.
You said that you feel like you‘ve barely touched the surface of what you want to say. What would you like your listeners to know or what would you want them to feel when they’re listening to you?
I would want them to feel seen. Not necessarily by me, but by the song. I want to build a community that feels like they’re all connected by the same love. Not the same love of me (laughs) but the same love of music. I hope I can facilitate a space that’s safe for the community. I don’t want my fans to put me on a pedestal, because the pressure of that – even though I’m not a very big artist – I can already feel that’s gonna be too much for me.
I’d like them to have some sort of understanding of who I am. They don’t need to know everything about me, because I won’t be sharing everything about me online or in songs. It’s not going to be explicit, but I just want them to know me as a person and not just an artist or a product that releases music.
You mean sometimes people don’t really consider that the artist is a person and not just a product?
Yeah. I know that that’s how the music industry has been built – to put artists forward as products instead of people who are making music.
Overthinking Overthinking
I’ve listened to your latest EP Lungs which you released a few months ago, as well as to your new single “Break My Own Heart”, and I felt like in several of the songs anxiety and overthinking is a topic. Would you call yourself an overthinker?
Oh yeah!
So, how does being an overthinker affect you as an artist? In a positive or negative way, or both?
It can be can be quite good! I mean, being an overthinker just means that I’m also a perfectionist as well. So it does mean that I usually make sure that I’m getting to a point where I’m 100% confident to release a song. Because if I’m not 100% sure, it just makes me feel very anxious about a project. I have to make sure that I’m thinking a lot about what singing and performing the song feels like.
When I was working on Lungs with my co-writers Emily Philips and Wayne Wilkins, for example, I realized that I didn’t want people to hear this song. That was back in 2019. After the recording session I was too embarrassed of my own vulnerability. I was afraid people would ask me what the song is about and then think I’m really weird and overly dramatic and a bit delusional – all of which I am! But I’m owning it now.
Overthinking helped me to release the song at a time when I actually felt good about it. But overthinking also means that it takes me really long to do stuff.
Just the Beginning
I’ve been looking at the cover of Lungs. It shows you in a wedding dress, standing in a church. How did you come up with that aesthetic?
It’s so funny, because I never thought I’m going to wear a wedding dress, and this is going to be like the wedding dress aesthetic in a church. I just thought the color made sense because it was quite pure and the song is me just being purely myself, being very vulnerable. My initial idea for the music video was going to be a bit more period drama-esque, wearing some sort of Regency-era dress, running through fields and stuff like that. But obviously budget doesn’t allow for that kind of stuff when you’re at a small label and just starting off. After the music video came out people just assumed I was wearing a wedding dress. And it makes sense in a way because the song is about me being ready to give absolutely everything – like getting married – to a person, who does not give a fuck.
Ruti, you have taken huge steps in your career this year. Looking at what you’ve reached so far, do you have any favorite memories?
Oh, yes. One of my favorite gigs I’ve ever played was when I supported Adele at Hyde Park. That was pretty cool. I was one of nine. So obviously Adele was the ninth person on the bill. It was her British Summertime Festival show. It’s a big show, and they choose the little lineup. When I heard I had been chosen I was really excited because it feels like Adele was the singer that got me into singing.
I love how it feels to sing in front of people or on stage. And yeah, I just felt like an artist. I felt like, Oh, I’m a singer, who releases music and people listen to it! Even though I’ve been doing it for about seven years I really felt like I’m starting now.
“Break My Own Heart” by Ruti is out now via PMR Records. Stay up to date with Ruti via their Instagram or Website.